


Hands

by cestmabiologie



Category: Orphan Black
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-22
Updated: 2016-01-22
Packaged: 2018-05-15 14:48:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5789458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cestmabiologie/pseuds/cestmabiologie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I think about Beth Childs + hands a lot. Here are some headcanons.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hands

**Author's Note:**

> warnings: gun mentions, brief allusions to self-harm and suicide

**I.**

Beth’s hands are strong. Someone once told her the importance of a firm handshake and she never took a hand again without giving it a little extra squeeze. She wanted to show confidence. Turns out men think she’s flirting. She isn’t sure how she feels about this. She notices that so many handshakes are weak. So many hands are limp and unresisting in hers. She feels like she’s crushing their fingers together. She isn’t sure how she feels about this.

**II.**

When Beth holds hands she is solid and present. She laces fingers through fingers and feels knuckles and tendons under her fingertips and it feels safe and it feels good.

**III.**

The first time Beth’s hands hold a gun she’s terrified. The first time they fire it she’s exhilarated. Her heart stops to the sound of exploding gunpowder. Then it races with possibilities. The constant noise of anxieties and fears (what if what if what if) is quieter than usual. There is power here. She can use it. To fight? If she has to. To protect? Yes. To protect.

**IV.**

When Beth was a child she sucked her thumb. She had a security blanket. They made her feel safe. She stopped sucking her thumb after a sleepover when she was nine; she has no idea what happened to that blanket. It might have been lost. It might have been loved away to scraps and memories. But now when she sleeps, she sleeps with a fistful of bedsheets and with a hand curled against her cheek.

**V.**

Beth’s hands are storytellers. Her fingers twist and knot together when they should be still. The heels of her palms press into her thighs.  They’d press her skin into bruises if she bruised easily. Her fingers pick and pick and pick at each other and she doesn’t realize (until she does and her hands are shoved raw into pockets where they can pick at seams and threads and tiny aggregates of dust). They peel labels off of beer bottles and water bottles and pill bottles and she doesn’t realize (until she does and she shreds them with her fingers or tries to stick them back together or sweeps them out of sight).

**VI.**  

Beth’s hands are careful. Meticulous. She folds her clothes carefully and stacks them neatly. When she takes off her shoes, she sets them down gently side by side and they are placed exactly right.

**VII.**

Beth’s hands are still.


End file.
